Italian War of 1499-1504

The Italian War of 1499-1504 was the second of the Italian Wars, fought primarily by Kings Louis XII of France and Ferdinand II of Aragon. The war was started by King Louis, who sought to press his claims to the thrones of Milan and Naples, but the result of the war was the Spanish conquest of the Kingdom of Naples from France.

War
Immediately following the death of King Charles VIII of France, his successor, Louis XII, concluded an alliance with the Republic of Venice and obtained some Swiss Pikemen. In 1499, he invaded the Duchy of Milan under the condition that Lombardy be split between Venice and France; he was intent on enforcing his family's claim to the throne of Milan from Ludovico Sforza. Papal support for the campaign was given in exchange for French support for Cesare Borgia in his Romagna campaigns, and the combined French-Papal forces entered Milan, only to find it deserted; Leonardo da Vinci's large horse sculpture had been dismantled and melted down into cannons. Ludovico Sforza's armies were scattered, and he was soon captured and imprisoned in France. The Papal armies proceeded to use French troops to assist in their conquest of the Romagna region, with Cesare Borgia besieging and conquering Forli from Caterina Sforza, who was chained and brought to Rome as a prisoner. With the Sforza lands in French and Papal hands - Milan was to be a major French base for the next twelve years - the first phase of the war was over.

On 11 November 1500, Louis XII concluded an alliance with Ferdinand II of Aragon, and the two monarchs planned to split the spoils of war acquired from invading the Kingdom of Naples. Louis claimed that he was the true heir to the throne of Naples, as the present king of Naples, Frederick of Naples, was the son of Alfonso II of Naples, who had abdicated the throne in favor of King Charles VIII of France in 1495. On 2 August 1501, French and Spanish armies seized Naples, but the French and Spanish quarreled over the division of the spoils of war, leading to war between the two kingdoms.

In the second half of 1502, the Spanish general Gonzalo Fernandez de Cordoba began to enact a strategy of luring the French into complacency. The two sides only engaged in skirmishes for the majority of the first phase of this stage of the war, and the Spanish used the strength of their supply lines (thanks to the Spanish Navy) and the rifts within the French ranks (caused by infighting between French and Italian nobles) to turn the tables. The Spanish defeated the French at Cerignola and Garigliano in April and December 1503, respectively, and King Louis left Naples on 2 January 1504, withdrawing to Lombardy. On 31 January 1504, the war was concluded with the Treaty of Lyon, defining the two nations' control of Italy; France ruled northern Italy from Milan, while Spain ruled southern Italy (including Naples) from Sicily.

As a side note, the war was also the last one involving the Borgia papacy. While the war between France and Spain raged on in the south, the Papal forces found themselves challenged at home by enemies of the Borgia clan. From 1500 to 1503, the Roman Assassins' Guild and Bartolomeo d'Alviano's mercenaries liberated Rome from the Borgia towers and from Cesare Borgia's lieutenants, and the Pope's death in August 1503 and Borgia's arrest for murder, betrayal, and incest in December 1503 sealed the fate of the Borgia papacy. Now, France and Spain would be the two main power-brokers in Italy.